Adventure Divas Page 9

  The third area, which we have yet to see, is beyond a rattan wall, and is the families’ individual cooking and sleeping quarters. Under the structure reside, according to my keen olfactory and auditory sleuthing skills, pigs and chickens.

  I say good afternoon to an older woman who is sitting on the floor with a red and yellow sarong knotted above her breasts, husking rice. “Salamat tongah-hari.”

  “Rindu amat betemu enggau nuan,” she responds in kind with a blood-red smile, and then spits between the slats in the floorboards, adding betel-nut juice to the menagerie below.

  “You are our honored guests and the festivities will begin soon,” says the headman, with Martin translating.

  Our ungraceful arrival was hardly honorable, but clearly Vanessa and Martin had done their groundwork. My expectations for the evening are high after having read Rajahs and Rebels by a guy named Robert Pringle, who wrote in 1970, “A vigorous tradition of hospitality has come to be a hallmark of longhouse life. . . . Longhouse dwellers are typically open and gregarious with foreigners, eager for news of the outside world, and extremely fond of entertaining. There is often dancing and more often drink, and the fun may go on for most of the night.” The Iban are also known for their confidence and pluck.

  I ask a young girl about a toilet. “Dini endor kitai mandi?” She takes me back through her family’s private space beyond the rattan wall. Our sleeping bags are already piled in an area where we will sleep with our host family. In the rear of the space, the floor slopes down into a short passage that leads to a dark room with a blazing open hearth. Giant black pots sizzle with the impending feast, and an older woman crouches next to the fire tending to an eviscerated critter twirling on a spit, flames dancing off its charred hide. The girl shows me to a door off to the left of the cooking room. At this point, with Seattle three sleepless nights in my rearview mirror, my exhaustion has graduated to the daze phase, and my synapses sputter instead of fire. I go into the dark and tiny room with a cement floor and corrugated metal walls. I look down and barely make out a squatter toilet. That is, a hole in the ground with imprints for footpads to aid in your balance and aim-taking. There is no flushing or toilet paper involved—merely a saucepan of water to move things along.

  A tiny stream of light slices through a crack in the wall. I have not slept since Tuesday and we have been traveling in ninety-five-degree heat (and just about as much humidity) all day, yet the London series producer’s pleading that I “spruce up” (“Just a bit of color would be grand”) is what echoes in my mind. I want to please the broadcaster, but I don’t want to appear vain to the crew—or ridiculous to our Iban hosts—and thus I find myself bent over in a wet, slightly putrid, cement-floored room, trying to catch the single shaft of light in my two-inch drugstore pocket mirror and apply Bobbi Brown’s Brillant à Lèvres Raspberry Shimmer #8 lipstick.

  Ker-plunk.

  Oh god.

  I have dropped the mirror into the hole.

  Oh ghaaad.

  I stand in the dark room, panicking, trying to figure out what to do.

  The mirror is expendable, but the consequences of a drop and dash—i.e., clogging the rudimentary plumbing system of one hundred people—would qualify as bad manners, if not septic suicide. I want to weep with fatigue and disgust, but this is no time for a talent hissy fit.

  I’ve got to Go In.

  I roll up my sleeve, turn my head, hold my breath, and squint. I plunge my hand four inches down the pipe, and feel a potpourri of chunky spindly oozy stuff, but no mirror.

  God please.

  I sink two more inches and my fingertips graze the mirror’s plastic edge.

  Don’t barf, don’t barf.

  One more thrust into the muck and, oh, oh—I’ve got it!

  I wet-nap down, and join the party, Bobbi Brown intact.

  When I return, the tuak—rice wine—is flowing heartily and the cameras are rolling. Georgie is filming a young Iban women who is dancing. “She took off her sarong and AC/DC T-shirt and put on some traditional kit,” confides Georgie. “I guess both outfits are authentic. I didn’t ask her to change,” Georgie adds, with a hint of defensiveness.

  We are all sensitive about barging into an indigenous culture and, worse yet, misrepresenting reality. The execs might prefer the Iban of one hundred years ago, but in fact this is a tribe that has been exposed to “visitors” since the fifteenth century (the Portuguese, the Dutch, the Brits, the Japanese), as well as to missionary influence. There is little chance our bumbling would cause any cosmic shift; but there is a fair chance, if we are not careful, that we will cross the line that marks disrespect and display unacceptably bad manners.

  Growing up in the Midwest, manners consisted mainly of never discussing sex, always bringing the Jell-O salad, and remembering to say, “Thanks for coming!” or “Thanks for having me!” after sleepovers. (Come to think of it, that’s the closest we got to discussing sex.) But I’ve learned that being a mannerly guest in a global context requires more; it requires one to drink, eat, smoke, snort, and chew a wide variety of animal, vegetable, and, occasionally, synthetic materials. I try to avoid anything concocted in suburban basements and derived from cleaning agents, but short of that, good manners usually involve intake—regardless of a few dead brain cells or a wide-eyed night.

  So I sip my fourth glass of fermented rice booze that tastes like sake resin, and settle in for the evening’s events.

  Twenty of us, our crew and other invited inhabitants of the longhouse, sit on mats on the floor in a large circle and the women serve us a feast of steamed rice in bamboo cylinders, leafy green vegetables, and dried fish. The girls and women dress in heavily embroidered cloth with many bangles and wear skirts made of interwoven coins. The headman says a blessing and his lithe, tattooed arm swings a stunning black and orange rooster, with its darting eyes and poised-to-snap white beak, over the food. He deftly plucks two grand tail feathers from the bird’s behind as an offering to the gods.

  “I thought you said it would be sacrificed. You know, a blood offering,” Rik whispers to Vanessa, disappointed.

  “This isn’t a wealthy longhouse. They can’t afford to kill a valuable cock for an offering,” she responds.

  The offering has been made and it is time to eat—and drink. Destroying social harmony is a major transgression in a longhouse, and as our “host” I am expected to imbibe, drink for drink, with the hosts. Tuak is passed in bowls and jugs and swilled with exhortations of “Ngirop, ngirop!” For the first hour, I feel confident that I can go head to head, as long as nobody breaks out the Jägermeister shots. The tuak is not terribly strong, though the copious amounts are worrying. The rest of the crew appear to be in their element.

  Events become fuzzy after hour two as my fatigue progresses from daze to death rattle. Interviews are derailed because I am unable to retain answers for more than six seconds, dashing any hope of a decent follow-up question. “Ngirop!” I hear as another sloppy tuak is thrust under my nose, and I sway with fatigue as much as anything else. By hour three, complete exhaustion taking hold, I am barely tracking conversations, including those in English. My last memory is an image of young Iban men in the middle of a circle kicking high and wild, full of athleticism and punch. “Some combination of traditional Iban dance and frat party gone bad,” I mutter to camera. And then, me and my Brillant à Lèvres #8 lips fall asleep, upright.

  “Royyt, cut, we’ve lost our presenter,” is the last thing I hear Rik say, and I am half-carried, half-rolled through a doorway adorned with a carving of a crocodile swathed in a snake.

  That night, dreams come fitfully. Snakes are slithering all over me and out of my hands, and I am unable to move. The auguries could be saying any number of things.

  1. I am in touch with the ancient power of the serpent who embodies the female principle; I may be pregnant; I may be poised to transform or evolve; I am definitely in touch with my libido; I am dangerous to the foolishly unwary (this, according to the historical
mythology of most ancient cultures).

  2. Patriarchy has subsumed all matriarchal realms; thus, I am scared of the all-powerful penis and my own sexuality. I have issues (this, according to Freud et al.).

  3. Animals and dreams are the vehicle for messages sent from the parallel universe, which is with us at all times. The female god who rules that parallel universe is represented by the serpent dragon. The upshot: Someone important is trying to send me a message (this, according to Iban cosmology).

  4. The holey mosquito net, which binds twelve of us (our crew and the host family) in a row like corpses, has pinned me in place and I underwent a nocturnal panic attack that manifested itself in my sleep as snakes (this, according to my logic).

  The still-alive cock—caakkaaa cooo, caakkaaa cooo—brings an end to sleep. I rouse to a symphony of snores. A four-legged animal of some sort snuffles below the slatted wooden floor. The surrounding jungle is warming up its diurnal chorus; birds and trees and fish all stretch for the day ahead.

  I keep my eyes shut and try to wring a bit more sleep from the short night, but the sounds and smells of jungle life won’t allow it. I reluctantly open my eyes and see two giant dogs at the far end of the gallery scratching their hindquarters, their beefy back legs slapping on the wood floor. Thump. Thump. Thump.

  Scratching hindquarters sounds appealing, as the mosquitoes have left no flesh unturned, but first I must unwind the net from my neck and ankles. I notice Vanessa scratch, and raise my right eyebrow to say Join me for some caffeine?

  The kitchen is not yet operational but there is a fire crackling outside. We climb down the ladder and join a woman who I noticed spent all yesterday afternoon at the loom. Today she is making tea; “Salamat pagi, ngirop,” she says, the last word sending a wave of nausea through my gut as she hands me a cup to drink. We nod and sip.

  Vanessa, ever the on-task producer, even at six A.M., says something in Iban to the woman.

  “What did you ask?”

  “If this longhouse had heads.”

  Vanessa’s practiced competence in Iban tells me that Martin coached her, and that she considers the headhunting story key—in other words, a nutgrab. If this were an Adventure Divas shoot we might be asking about the intricate cultural storytelling that is embedded in the patterns of the weaving that the women create with their loom work, but on this shoot, dusty human skulls are the sexier angle we’re chasing down.

  Poor Borneo.

  The rain forest is a natural wonder, filled with thousands of species, only a fraction of them named, much less understood. Both sanctioned and renegade logging decimates the environment. The island is one of only two remaining habitats of the mighty orangutan. All this, yet the only word that comes to many people’s minds when they think about Borneo is headhunter.

  The woman points up toward a corner of the gallery. Vanessa and I trade looks, and gulp down our tea. We climb back up the ladder and walk slowly toward the far corner, protected from direct light. Hanging in a net, strung between a wooden beam and the ceiling, are a half-dozen eerie, rough-hewn, grayish, charbroiled, seven-inch-diameter orbs: human heads.

  They look like a bunch of giant, calcified, rotten grapes.

  “Dear. I guess that’s one way to resolve neighborly disputes,” says Vanessa with a nervous laugh.

  The headman, a title that suddenly takes on new meaning, walks up behind us, with Martin, Rik, and Georgie in tow.

  I am stymied as to how to start the interview.

  “Um, what is the significance of the heads and how old are they?”

  “These heads were taken seventy years ago, by my great-grandfather,” he tells me. “There was a raid on another longhouse.”

  Martin adds that headhunting largely came to an end in the forties (the white rajahs found the practice unsavory and discouraged it—often by sending others to take the heads of those who took heads), but there were a few cases of Japanese heads being taken during World War II.

  “They are powerful. They bring good fortune and a strong harvest to the longhouse,” says the headman, with Martin continuing to translate.

  For the Iban, heads were (and still are) associated with the fertility of both their women and their rice fields. Historically, heads were also taken to mark the end of a mourning period. The head possesses a strong spirit, and when a head was taken, it was thought that its spirit then belonged to the new owner. In many ancient cultures, the head and spine are said to contain a person’s essence (Polynesians call it mana). To the Iban, heads are chock-full of essence that serves to replenish the family or village when hung inside the longhouse.

  “Even now, a longhouse without heads is not a lucky place,” says Martin.

  “Do you want me to take one down?” the headman asks.

  “I, uh, well,” I say, stumbling. I’m all for good television but am conflicted about holding a human head—a powerful orb of fertility. “Will we have to replace it if we drop it?”

  Even now, if you read the Bornean news carefully, you’ll find that amid the run-of-the-mill murders that all societies have, there are still a fair number of decapitations. But lest we judge, every country seems to have a preferred, culturally based method of suicide and murder. Decapitation is to Borneo as immolation is to India, as gunplay is to the United States, as hanging from a construction crane is to Iran.

  “We all have our fatal traditions,” I say to Vanessa, after we’ve gleaned all we could from the headhunter story, and begin to load up the canoes for our return trip.

  I’ve heard the locals say “upriver is a state of mind.” Perhaps this is why the jungle seems different this time as we navigate its waterways. What seemed just a day ago to be a nefarious Rorschach test begins to reveal enchanting patterns and wildlife whimsy. Chains of orchids (of which there are some three thousand species in Borneo, which boasts 10 percent of the world’s total orchid population) outline the trunks of sixty-foot-tall trees; chaotic assemblies of vines become launchpads for kingfishers and starlings. Rhododendrons, their red blossoms bursting, push branches closer to the water. The regular crashing and crackling in the forest adds dimension, rather than warning. Even the rapids, which on the way in sent soundman John leaping to keep his equipment dry, are being welcomed as a good rollick and an opportunity to admire spectacular boatmanship attuned to the uneven depths and eddies the river put in our path.

  Halfway back to hot water and Internet, we stop at a riverside community. Three old ladies, two in floral sarongs and one in a man’s work shirt, are sitting on mats in the shade, under a crop of jutting jungle flora that protects them from a blazing midday sun. The woman on the left waves me over and hands me the makings of a betel-nut chew. Martin joins us. I fold together the areca nut, betel leaf, and limey paste, then wedge the bundle between my cheek and gums.

  “Spit,” she says when she sees me struggling with profuse red saliva. “Ladies don’t swallow.” I swear I see a wave of giggles subtly pass over the old women’s faces. We all squat and spit and enjoy a little communal buzz. The heavy, steady song of the cicadas skips and lilts down its endless trail; and I wonder at the thousands of species that are listening to the very same tune.

  A mere two days in the jungle have made my dreams ripe with the place and its creatures. That night, at the Shangri-La Hotel in Kota Kinabalu, I dream that thousands of orangutans are boarding the luxury liner Queen Elizabeth II. There are far too many wanting entrance and many are falling off the edges, off the gangplank, dropping into the water and dying. Splash. Plunk. Collapse. Bang. Bang Bang BANG on my door. I wake with a snap, jolted and sad, and late for our flight to Sabah, where we’re going to do a story on the endangered orangutans.

  We arrive in the town of Sandakan to visit a sanctuary for the animal that shares nearly 98 percent of DNA with us humans and is referred to by conservationists as the world’s most “charismatic megafauna,” that is, mega-useful for conservation campaigns. (Think whales, seals, wolves, pandas.)

  The street leading
to the Sepilok Orang Utan Rehabilitation Centre teems with the skinny, long-limbed monkeys known as gibbons. One chucks a stick at the van and it pings off the hood.

  We walk by two nubile European interns who are holding baby orangutans. “What is it with chicks and chimps?” I ask.

  “Tits, mate,” replies Georgie. “All these babies lose their mums and crave surrogates—emotionally, anyway.”

  Orangutans, whose name comes from the Malay word meaning “person of the forest,” have been brachiating (moving hand over hand) through the forests for an estimated two million years. They once covered all of Southeast Asia and numbered in the hundreds of thousands; now they only exist in small, protected areas of tropical rain forest on the islands of Sumatra and Borneo. The orangutan population is down to under twenty thousand, and dropping.

  In Sumatra, I saw wild orangutans in the tropical rain forest. Snap! Crash! Crackle! we’d hear, and look up to see an orange flash in the jungle canopy overhead. Our hearts raced and for a minute we forgot about the oppressive, perpetual damp. But that was before the fires of the late 1990s, a devastation that left many orangutans orphaned, injured, and hungry. The fires were partially caused by global climate change: Traditionally, the farmers and loggers set fire to their land every year, and the fires are extinguished by the monsoons. However, one year, the monsoons never came, and the fires raged uncontrolled through hundreds of thousands of acres of one of the richest forests in the world.

  In both Sumatra and Borneo, mechanized logging and palm-oil plantations are destroying orangutan habitat. In addition to land conversion (which fosters fires), poachers shoot the mother orangutans (who eat from the palm trees when faced with diminishing habitats), peel the babies off of the corpses, and sell them into a black market that peddles baby orangs as pets–cum–status symbols. Some live in captivity for years, well into adolescence and adulthood; many die of disease (or some say depression); others make their way to rehab centers with the aid of people who are sensitive to, and informed about, their plight. Sepilok is one such center, a halfway house of sorts. Whatever their respective histories, each orangutan at this center is learning how to be an orangutan, and, it is hoped, will eventually return to the rain forest. The youngest, and those not in captivity long, have the best chance of returning to their native habitat.